Wednesday, March 12, 2014

“Our faith teaches us that in the face of suffering, we can’t stand idly by, and that we must be that Good Samaritan.” So said President Obama during the Prayer Breakfast the other week. So say his progressive allies and friends, and his administration, too . . . all the way to the courthouse.

Begin with the most obvious example: the court case brought against the administration by the Little Sisters of the Poor. The Little Sisters argue that their refusal to comply with the HHS contraception-and-abortifacients mandate on grounds of conscience will incur some $2.5 million in annual fines. That’s $2.5 million that could otherwise feed, house, and warm those for whom they care.

If the appeal doesn’t go their way, the administration will have successfully kneecapped their unique mission among the old, the sick, and the dying, whom they take in and treat as “family” when everyone else has thrown them out.

All of which raises an interesting point. From the perspective of sheer public relations, taking on the Little Sisters should have been the political equivalent of slapping babies. Why wasn’t it?"